33-year-old socialist Zohran Mamdani beat 67-year-old former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo in New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary on Tuesday night, and is well on his way to becoming the city’s first Muslim mayor. 

Cuomo conceded the race earlier in the evening after Mamdani received nearly 44% of the votes with 90% of the votes counted at 10:30 p.m. ET. The former governor said at a watch party: “He deserved it. He won.” He told the NY Times that he may still run in the November mayoral election as an independent, saying “I want to analyze and talk to some colleagues.” 

That said, as the Guardian notes, given how left-leaning NYC is along with the unpopularity of incumbent mayor Eric Adams, Mumdani is likely to become New York’s 11th mayor.

Mamdani’s proposals include rent freezes, free buses, and city-run grocery stores which would be funded by $10 billion in new taxes on corporations and the wealthy. 

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Sen. Bernie Sanders congratulated Mamdani on his win, with AOC writing on X “Billionaires and lobbyists poured millions against you and our public finance system. And you won.” 

Congratulations, @ZohranKMamdani!

Your dedication to an affordable, welcoming, and safe New York City where working families can have a shot has inspired people across the city.

Billionaires and lobbyists poured millions against you and our public finance system.

And you won. https://t.co/YbJFsYjemm

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) June 25, 2025

Which may not bode well for the city’s corporate tax revenues. As The Free Press noted last week, New York business owners plan to flee both the city and the state if Mamdani wins…

“We may consider closing our supermarkets and selling the business,” said 76-year-old billionaire John Catsimatidis of Gristedes Supermarkets, adding “We have other businesses. Thank God, we have other businesses.”

He also suggested that his real estate conglomerate – Red Apple Group, may move to New Jersey too.

“There’s the possibility we’d move our corporate offices to New Jersey. Why not?” he said. “Then you’d have four years of peace.”

Probably not a bad idea…

NEW: Former rapper and socialist New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani has pulled ahead of Andrew Cuomo in the city’s primary, according to a new poll.

Mamdani, 33, has pulled ahead of Cuomo in a new Emerson poll, leading him 52% to 48%.

Mamdani is accused of voicing his… pic.twitter.com/bMmwDV0AnI

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) June 23, 2025

*  *  *

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

They came. They bunker-busted. They fled.

And then they set the stage to control the narrative via a massive P.R. operation.

POTUS hailed the “spectacular” victory of B-2s flying from the US to West Asia to release MOPs (“Massive Ordnance Penetrators) over Fordow in the middle of the night of June 22 (significantly, the same date of the start of Operation Barbarossa in 1941).

Trump 2.0 functionaries gloated that the Iranian nuclear program was now gone.

That’s the reality show. Now for reality. Mannan Raisi, a member of the Iranian Majlis (Parliament) from the holy city of Qom, summed it all up: “Contrary to the statements of the lying US President, the nuclear facilities at Fordow were not seriously damaged. Only the above-ground structures, which can be restored, were destroyed. In addition, everything that could pose a danger to the population was evacuated in advance. There are no reports of any nuclear emissions. Trump’s false claims about the ‘destruction of Fordow’ are refuted by the fact that the attacks were so superficial that there were not even any fatalities at the facility.”

What really matters is that the Empire of Chaos, in a single – spectacularly criminal – raid, bunker-busted the UN charter (again); international law (again); the NPT (perhaps for good); the US constitution; the “international community”; and Trump’s own MAGA base.

The Global South is now doing the math – and drawing the necessary conclusions.“Peace through strength” POTUS now owns two wars; a genocide; and an unprovoked attack by a nuclear superpower on behalf of a nuclear power against a non-nuclear power.

The IRGC’s response was swift: the real war starts now. The Zionist axis will pay – in spades. It will not be a full-scale war against the Empire: that’s supremely un-strategic. What will develop is multi-layered death by a thousand cuts.

That was already in effect in the morning of June 23. Iran launched no less than five multi-directional waves of missiles – covering the whole of Israel, including new targets such as Ashdod port and power station. The Israeli interception rate fell below 50%. All hell broke loose – from alert siren malfunctions to power outages. Knesset members fled. An El Al rescue flight from New York was forced to turn back in mid-air when missiles started flying.

The message: the whole of Israel is now a legitimate target – reached within minutes by Kheybar-Shakan, Emad, Qadr, and Fattah-1 missiles.

The Strait of Hormuz: the ultimate card

Iran’s upgraded priorities include: stop the war on Gaza and southern Lebanon; “evolve” the nuclear doctrine (all bets are off); targeted assassinations of Zionist leaders; more strikes on Mossad; more missile barrages on Tel Aviv, Haifa and Dimona.

There will be no direct war on the Empire of Chaos. The blockade of the Strait of Hormuz is the ultimate Iranian card, not the nuclear card: it won’t be played in full for now. At best there could be a partial blockade of oil shipping to the – fragmented – collective West.

A top former Deep State source confirmed that “the CIA advised the Trump administration that China was resolutely against the shutting down of the Strait of Hormuz, so Trump went ahead with the bombing.”

Shutting down the Strait of Hormuz will detonate a global depression of unforeseem magnitude. The loss of over 20% of the world’s oil supply will trigger the implosion of over two quadrillion dollars of derivatives, as was already speculated by Goldman Sachs projections in the late 2010s. Warren Buffett described it as a chain reaction after a nuclear explosion.

As it stands, Tehran learned a lesson the hardest way. It’s not that the Iranian leadership acted immorally: on the contrary, its belief in diplomacy and serious negotiations proved totally at odds at with the US empire’s totally debased modus operandi.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi summed it all up. Iran was negotiating with the US “when Israel decided to blow up that diplomacy.” Then Iran was talking “with the E3/EU when the US decided to blow up that diplomacy.” Ergo, it’s absurd to order Iran to “return” to the table: “How can Iran return to something it never left, let alone blew up?”

At the St. Petersburg forum, President Putin was very clear that “we support Iran and the struggle for its legitimate interests, including peaceful use of atomic energy.” He added, crucially: “Those who say Russia is not a reliable partner are provocateurs.”

Putin himself said earlier that week that Russia had previously offered to bolster Iran’s air defenses, but was not taken up on that offer. It also is no secret that unlike the treaty with North Korea, the Russia-Iran strategic partnership agreement didn’t feature a collective security provision.

That may be about to change.

There have been no substantial leaks yet on the Putin-Araghchi meeting – but supremely touchy issues would have to have been discussed. Putin reaffirmed, “the absolutely unprovoked aggression against Iran has no basis and no justification.” Then, he added, cryptically: “Russia is taking steps to support the Iranian people.”

Today, Putin meets Iranian FM Araghchi in Moscow.

No one should be surprised if Iran decides that it now has to possess a nuclear weapon as a deterrent to the Zionist axis. One option floated by some analysts – although extremely touchy on several levels – would be a full security partnership with Russia and perhaps China, with Iran positioned under their nuclear umbrella.

After all these are three top BRICS nations – the revamped Primakov triangle and the Empire war is fundamentally a war against BRICS.

This new deal would at least keep Iran’s own nuclear enrichment as a civilian, scientific and non-military process, allowing the Russia-China strategic partnership to supervise uranium enrichment while providing security guarantees to Iran.

Additionally, that would be a security guarantee for the International North South Transportation Corridor (INSTC) – which is in the strategic national interest of Russia.

The Chinese view is another very complex matter. There’s some sort of consensus among Chinese think tanks that Iran should now, more than ever, strengthen their air defense system. That likely means taking up Russia on its earlier offer to cooperate in this area.

A long dark cloud is coming down

Trump entering the – suicidal – war of Israel/US neocons on Iran just adds a new layer to the Big Picture. That was predictable since at least the late 1990s: the same playbook of controlling West Asia’s energy resources to enhance the economic power of the Empire of Chaos, while intimidating the Global South: don’t even think of deviating from our unilateral order.

Even POTUS himself gave away the game, in caps: “If the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change? MIGA!”

Inestimable Prof. Michael Hudson, among a few others, has summarized the stakes: “Iran is not only the capstone to full control of the Near East and its oil and dollar holdings. Iran is a key link for China’s Belt and Road program for a New Silk Road of railway transport to the West. If the United States can overthrow the Iranian government, this interrupts the long transportation corridor that China already has constructed and hopes to extend further West. Iran also is a key to blocking Russian trade and development via the Caspian Sea and access to the south, bypassing the Suez Canal. And under U.S. control, an Iranian client regime could threaten Russia from its southern flank.”

So it’s no wonder that regime change in Tehran – that’s what the whole war is all about – is a matter of supreme national interest for US elites, in the sense stressed by Prof. Hudson of a “coercive empire of client states observing dollar hegemony by adhering to the dollarized international financial system.”

Now compare all of the above with the tenor of the discussions at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) last week. The forum ended in the evening of June 20. The US attacked Iran in the middle of the night of June 22.

Virtually the whole Global South was in St. Petersburg; at least 15,000 people. Over a thousand deals were signed, amounting to over $80 billion, according to Executive Secretary of the SPIEF Organizing Committee Anton Kobakov.

There were enlightening panels all around: on the challenges of the Northern Sea Route, one of the key connectivity corridors of the 21st century; on Russia-China mutual investments; on the reform of the international financial system; on the fight against fake news – an industry the West excels in – and AI controlling all narratives; on BRICS, the SCO, the EAEU, ASEAN, the INSTC.

At the plenary session, the Global South and BRICS were fully represented: Russia, China, Indonesia (President Prabowo was the guest of honor), South Africa, Bahrain. President Putin cut to the chase: “Russia and China aren’t shaping the new world order – it’s rising naturally, like the sun. We’re only paving the way to make it more balanced.”

Yet along dark cloud is coming down, as the Empire of Chaos will go no holds barred to block the sunrise. Russia’s representative at the UN Vasily Nebenzya nailed it, sharp as a dagger: “The US has opened Pandora’s box (…) No one knows what new catastrophes and suffering it will bring.”

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

Florida officials are building a massive detention facility for illegal aliens, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” for its swampy location teeming with deadly predators.

The proposed facility’s site is the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, tucked along the eastern edge of Big Cypress National Preserve, about 55 miles west of Miami. Florida had big plans for it back in the day, aiming to transform it into the “Everglades Jetport,” a massive airport poised to dwarf all others. But eco-activists and environmental worries slammed the brakes on that dream in the 1970s, leaving the project grounded.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier (R) announced plans for the project last week, expressing support for President Donald Trump’s immigration policies. “I think this is the best one, as I call it: Alligator Alcatraz,” Uthmeier quipped, nodding to the infamous San Francisco Bay prison island, Alcatraz.

“This 30-square mile area is completely surrounded by the Everglades. It presents an efficient, low-cost opportunity to build a temporary detention facility because you don’t need to invest that much in the perimeter,” the top Florida official said. “If people get out, there’s not much waiting for them other than alligators and pythons.”

Alligator Alcatraz: the one-stop shop to carry out President Trump’s mass deportation agenda. pic.twitter.com/96um2IXE7U

— Attorney General James Uthmeier (@AGJamesUthmeier) June 19, 2025

Uthmeier said the area is “virtually abandoned” and was given approval within a week. In a Monday interview with conservative podcaster Benny Johnson, the Florida attorney general said the detention center is on track to house 5,000 beds by early July.

This morning, I joined @bennyjohnson and announced that Alligator Alcatraz will be moving forward!

In Florida, the swamp means something different. pic.twitter.com/KGrHZS2DjT

— Attorney General James Uthmeier (@AGJamesUthmeier) June 23, 2025

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Monday that the federal government will pour money into plan, tapping FEMA’s Shelter and Services Program to foot the bill.

“Under President Trump’s leadership, we are working at turbo speed on cost-effective and innovative ways to deliver on the American people’s mandate for mass deportations of criminal illegal aliens. We will expand facilities and bed space in just days, thanks to our partnership with Florida,” Noem said in a statement.

A DHS official told the Miami Herald that the facility will cost $450 million annually.

Authored by Sam Dorman via The Epoch Times,

The Supreme Court has already released major decisions for the 2024–2025 term, but some of its most consequential could still be in the making.

So far, the justices have ruled on religious liberty, gender-related issues, environmental policy, and a case with a large impact on the vaping industry. Yet, more opinions are coming—ones that, among other things, could help determine parents’ rights, funding for abortion organizations, and whether and how much lower court judges can block presidents’ agendas.

Here is a breakdown of what to expect as the term comes to an end:

Birthright Citizenship and Nationwide Injunctions

From President Donald Trump’s first term to his second, presidents have encountered a spike in judges’ orders that block presidents’ agendas on a nationwide basis. These nationwide injunctions have provoked concerns about the nation’s separation of powers and whether the judiciary is being gamed by political activists.

Three of these injunctions have targeted Trump’s attempt to limit birthright citizenship, which is a major portion of his immigration agenda. While the justices could weigh in on the constitutionality of Trump’s order, they will likely focus, at this point in litigation, on whether judges are exceeding their authority with such orders.

U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer told the justices in May that nationwide injunctions exceeded the power granted to judges under Article III of the Constitution. That article allows the federal judiciary to hear “cases” and “controversies,” a provision that some say means that judges’ orders should affect only the parties before them in court.

It’s unclear how the court will rule. The justices seemed divided during oral arguments on May 15. Regardless, the decision could alter the balance of power in the federal government for generations to come.

Sex and Gender in School Libraries

The court is expected to weigh in soon in Mahmoud v. Taylor. The case is about whether schools should be able to require children’s participation involving storybooks with controversial content about sexuality and gender.

A group of Christian and Muslim parents sued Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland, alleging that requiring their kids to hear storybooks without an opt-out on these topics burdened their parents’ exercise of religion under the First Amendment.

Part of their argument cited a Supreme Court precedent known as Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972), which said parents have a constitutional right to direct the religious upbringing of their children. Among the cited content in the current case is “Born Ready,” a book with a transgender character named Penelope who identifies as a boy.

The school district said that allowing children to opt out was not feasible and that its actions didn’t violate the First Amendment either because it wasn’t coercing children by exposing them to certain content.

During oral arguments in April, the Supreme Court seemed inclined to rule in the parents’ favor but could see some dissent.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, for example, asked how the county was burdening parents when they didn’t have to send their kids to public school. “You can put them in another situation,” she said. “You can home-school them.”

Age Verification for Porn Websites

Amid an explosion of online pornography, states have attempted to intervene to prevent health-related harms to young people. One such law from Texas has offered the justices an opportunity to analyze how regulations on pornography may or may not conflict with the First Amendment.

The Texas law requires pornographic websites to verify the age of their users. A porn industry group, known as the Free Speech Coalition, alleged that the requirement was too broad and therefore violated the First Amendment.

The coalition initially won in district court, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit allowed Texas’s age verification requirement to proceed. It said the requirement was rationally related to the state’s interest in protecting minors from pornography.

The Free Speech Coalition told the Supreme Court that the Fifth Circuit should have applied strict scrutiny. Under that standard, governments have to show that their laws are not overly broad and serve a compelling state interest.

Planned Parenthood and State Medicaid Funds

Planned Parenthood and abortion are back at the Supreme Court. But this time, the case focuses on how much money the abortion provider gets through Medicaid.

In 2018, South Carolina’s government decided that abortion clinics enrolled in the program were unqualified to provide family planning services and shouldn’t receive funding.

Planned Parenthood and a patient sued, arguing that the federal law establishing Medicaid allowed recipients to choose their providers. During oral argument on April 2, the Supreme Court weighed whether the law created an enforceable right for recipients to sue if they didn’t have access to the provider they chose.

Obamacare Panel on Preventive Measures

A separate, health-related case focuses on a panel set up under Obamacare, otherwise known as the Affordable Care Act, to recommend preventive care for insurance to cover. The legal issue the Supreme Court is reviewing is less about particular recommendations and more about the structure of the Preventive Services Task Force.

A company known as Braidwood Management sued, alleging that the task force’s members had to be appointed by the president. They cited a provision of the Constitution known as the Appointments Clause.

When the case, which was initiated during the first Trump administration, reached a federal appeals court, Braidwood won on that point. The Supreme Court reviewed the issue after the Biden administration asked it to intervene. The current Trump administration continued the legal defense of the task force.

How far does a dollar really go across America?

As inflation has raised everything from housing costs to the price of eggs to record levels, consumers are feeling the burden. While tariffs stand to raise prices even further—although no meaningful signs in official data show this yet—price pressures have few signs of abating.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Dorthy Neufeld, shows price parity by U.S. state based on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).

How Price Parity Compares Across America

To show the differences in prices across the country, the BEA compared each state to the national average, represented as 100 as of 2023.

Ranking as the nation’s most expensive state, prices in California are 13% higher than the national average.

In particular, California’s housing rents are 58% higher overall, second-only to Washington, D.C.. at 69% in 2023. Typically, housing is the primary driver of price disparities across the country.

At the same time, Californians pay more for groceries than any other state—at around 10% higher than the U.S. average.

Ranking in third is New Jersey, driven largely by its proximity to New York. In addition to high housing costs, a separate report shows that people in the Garden State pay 32% more for household bills like utilities and health insurance than the U.S. average.

At the other end of the spectrum, southern states like Arkansas and Mississippi offer some of the lowest costs of living. In August 2024, the median home sale price in Arkansas was just $203,067 compared to the U.S. median of about $385,000. Beyond housing costs, daily expenses like transportation and utilities are also comparatively lower.

Similarly, median home prices in Mississippi stand at just $183,507, however, median household incomes fall below the national average, at $55,060.

To learn more about this topic from an affordability perspective, check out this graphic on home affordability scores by U.S. state.

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Sunday that whether Iran has decided to build a nuclear weapon is “irrelevant,” as he was pressed on the lack of evidence that Tehran has taken steps to weaponize its nuclear program.

Rubio made the comment in an interview with CBS News when asked about the fact that US intelligence has no evidence that Iran was seeking a bomb before Israel launched its war on the country.

“That’s irrelevant. I think that question being asked in the media – that’s an irrelevant question. They have everything they need to build a weapon,” Rubio said.

In March, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said that there was no evidence that Iran decided to build a nuclear weapon, and that was still the consensus of the US intelligence community, according to multiple media reports.

Rubio pointed to the fact that Iran was enriching uranium at 60%, which is still below the 90% needed for weapons-grade, as evidence that Iran has the capability to build a bomb, since it could quickly increase to the 90% level.

Iran had made clear when it was engaged in negotiations with the US that it was willing to bring its enrichment level back down to 3.67%, but the US decided to back an Israeli attack instead of pursuing such a deal and ultimately bombed three Iranian nuclear facilities.

Iran took the step to start enriching uranium at 60% in 2021 following an Israeli sabotage attack on its Natanz nuclear facility, which was meant to disrupt negotiations between the Biden administration and Iran that were ongoing at the time.

Rubio later adds in the segment, “Forget about intelligence…they are enriching uranium well beyond anything you need for a civil nuclear program.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio says “it’s irrelevant” whether the U.S. had intelligence showing Iran’s supreme leader had specifically ordered nuclear weaponization, saying “it doesn’t matter whether the order was given. They have everything they need to build nuclear weapons.”… pic.twitter.com/6YldeIc38u

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) June 22, 2025

The Islamic Republic has built its most sensitive nuclear sites deep underground given past sabotage attacks, and on fears of Israeli or US bombing raids against them, which is exactly what happened this weekend.

A week ago there were widespread reports and rumors that Israeli airstrikes and targeted assassinations in Iran had killed Esmail Qaani, who in 2020 had succeeded the top Iranian IRGC Quds Force general Qassem Soleimani, killed by a US strike in Baghdad.

But on Tuesday Qaani appeared before crowds in Tehran, as Iranians take to the streets to support the military and assert their defiance following Israeli and US bombs falling on the country during the current ceasefire.

“Several news outlets affiliated with Iran-allied groups, including the Houthis’ Al Masirah TV, have shared footage they say shows Esmail Qaani, head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’s Quds Force, among the rallying crowds in Tehran,” Al Jazeera writes.

“If confirmed, the videos would dispel reports that Qaani was assassinated by Israel,” the report concludes.

Below is video which disproves (assuming it is not a deepfake or impersonator) that Qaani was not killed in an Israeli airstrike last week:

Iran’s Quds Force commander Qaani reportedly shows up in Tehran. Iranian state media says he is alive. pic.twitter.com/U1t5siDJcP

— Clash Report (@clashreport) June 24, 2025

This latest flare-up in fighting between Israel and Iran is actually not the first time Qaani has falsely been reported dead.

Israeli broadcasters are featuring the video of his appearance Tuesday in Iranian streets, after the initial claim spread quickly in Israeli media…

תיעוד: איסמאעיל קאאני, מפקד כוח קודס במשמרות המהפכה, השתתף ב”חגיגות הניצחון” בטהראן – ובכך הזים את הדיווחים על חיסולו @OmerShahar123 pic.twitter.com/ieFP9atcxi

— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) June 24, 2025

Like with Russia-Ukraine, the fog of war is thick in the Iranian theatre, and there is evidence that both sides have national censors which are cracking down on what information gets shared, after some 12-days of exchanging deadly airstrikes and missile fire.

Authored by Bill King via RealClearPolitics.com,

For decades, we’ve been told that the world’s biggest problem is too many people. From Malthus in the 18th century to “The Population Bomb” in the 1960s, the warnings were dire: More people would mean more famine, more poverty, more environmental destruction. But something unexpected has happened. The demographic math has changed. And the United Nations, the world’s most cited authority on population forecasts, has taken notice.

Until recently, their models predicted that the global population would continue to grow throughout the 21st century, reaching a peak of nearly 11 billion by the year 2100. But in its 2022 and 2024 revisions, the U.N. quietly lowered its global population projections. The most recent estimate puts the peak at just 10.3 billion, and it comes nearly two decades earlier, around 2084.

That might still sound like a big number. But it’s a sharp departure from the “endless growth” assumptions many policymakers, investors, and institutions still use to guide their decisions. The real story is not just that the U.N. is forecasting fewer people. It’s that many demographers believe that even those numbers are still too high.

Fertility Collapse

The shift in projections isn’t happening because people are dying faster. In fact, life expectancy continues to rise, albeit modestly, in most parts of the world. The big change is that people are having fewer children – much fewer.

Around 1970, the global fertility rate (the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime) was about five children per woman. Today, it’s down to 2.25 and falling. In nearly 70% of the world’s countries, fertility rates are already below the so-called “replacement rate” – the level needed to maintain a stable population. In developed countries, that’s typically pegged at around 2.1 children per woman. In higher-mortality countries, it is slightly higher.

This global fertility decline has happened faster than most experts expected. And that’s why the U.N. has revised its models twice in just the last five years. But not everyone thinks the U.N. has gone far enough.

Over the last decade, several independent teams of researchers have developed alternative population projections. Most of them show that fertility will drop faster than the U.N. is predicting. A team at the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), for example, gained wide attention in 2020, when it projected that the global population would peak around 2064 at just over 9 billion and decline to about 8.8 billion by 2100.

Wolfgang Lutz, one of the world’s most respected demographers, has also published projections showing a lower and earlier population peak. Lutz’s group at the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital bases its models on education and urbanization trends, which are closely tied to fertility behavior. In a 2024 analysis of surveys involving over a million women in Sub-Saharan Africa, Lutz and his co-authors concluded that fertility rates there are falling faster than expected, especially as female education improves.

In their 2019 book, “Empty Planet,” Canadian journalists Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson summarized the case for the likelihood of the lower projections. While not academic demographers, they conducted extensive interviews and focus groups in about a dozen countries, asking women about their thoughts on family and childbearing. They concluded that the fertility collapse is as much cultural as economic, and that the cultural factors will drive down fertility rates further and faster than in the past.

“Predictions are hard – especially about the future.”

So said that famous American philosopher, Yogi Beara. As a result, all models use probabilistic variations that incorporate a wide range of possible futures.

For example, while the U.N.’s median projection sees a peak at 10.3 billion in 2084, their model also includes a low-fertility scenario, in which the population peaks around 2060 at 9.5 billion and declines from there.

That lower path aligns more closely with the academic projections.

It’s All About Africa

The fertility rate has already fallen to or below the replacement rate in countries where nearly three-quarters of the world’s population lives. In another 15%, the rate is only just above the replacement rate and is falling fast.

However, there are about two dozen countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Southwest Asia where the rate is still very high. Although these countries only account for about 11% of the world’s population, they will contribute nearly all of whatever population growth there is between now and whenever the population peaks. The common denominators in the countries that have kept birth rates high are a blend of religious fundamentalism (particularly fundamentalist Islam), limited international engagement, and weak state capacity.

Nonetheless, the birth rate is falling in these countries, albeit to varying extents. Most of the debate over the trajectory of future global population boils down to how fast and to what extent these countries will follow the same fertility decline seen in the rest of the world over the last 50 years.

Why This Matters

The population projections we rely on shape everything from how we plan cities to how we fund pensions. They inform immigration policy, school construction, military recruitment, and long-term economic growth assumptions. If those projections are off by a billion people or by two decades, that is not just a rounding error. It’s a seismic shift in the underlying math of the future.

However, most institutions continue to operate on autopilot, assuming that a growing population – encompassing more workers, consumers, and taxpayers – is the natural order that will persist indefinitely. However, the data clearly indicate that the era is rapidly coming to a close and the age of population growth is ending. Indeed, in some places, it already has. For the past three years, China has reported a decline in its population. What follows, and how we react to it, is one of the most critical and least understood stories of our time.

Iranian state media is reporting another arrest of alleged spy who was coordinating with Israeli intelligence. Agents working on behalf of Mossad are believed to have played key roles in Israel’s military attacks which kicked off nearly two weeks ago (on Friday, June 13).

But the new arrest announced on Tuesday has been identified as a European national – without much more information being provided from Fars News agency, which issued a statement.

The arrested individual was accused of “spying on sensitive and military areas” – according to the report. This comes amid a broader crackdown and search for people who may have been relaying sensitive and secret material, for example concerning the locations of Iran’s ballistic missiles and anti-air systems, to the Israeli government.

“Since the outbreak of conflict with Israel, Iran has arrested dozens of people and executed several accused of spying for Israel,” Al Jazeera reports.

“Earlier today, Iranian state media reported that six more people were arrested in the western Hamadan province for allegedly spying for Israel’s Mossad,” Al Jazeera says of Tuesday developments.

The trials appear to be taking place in rapid format, in military and judicial tribunals, sometimes convened in small rooms, at a moment Israeli warplanes have been striking sites in Tehran and across Western Iran.

It has become clear that Israel was engaged in a massive spying and espionage campaign to pave the way for its ‘Operation Rising Lion’ – which is intent on destroying Iran’s nuclear energy program, and possibly even accomplishing regime change.

The Washington Post reports on what’s been revealed as one of the most brazen recruitment operations aimed at top generals:

In the hours after Israel launched its first wave of strikes against Iran on June 13, killing top military leaders and nuclear scientists, Israeli intelligence operatives launched a covert campaign to intimidate senior officials with the apparent aim of dividing and destabilizing Tehran’s theocratic regime, according to three people familiar with the operation.

People working for Israel’s security services who speak Persian, Iran’s primary language, called senior Iranian officials on their cellphones and warned them that they, too, would die unless they ceased supporting the regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, according to the three people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss clandestine operations. One of them estimated that more than 20 Iranians in positions of power were contacted.

But what’s clear from all the reporting on this is that these generals were more loyal than expected – and this wasn’t met with success for Israeli intelligence. WaPo and others have republished an audio recording of one such call that took place June 13 – the day Israeli warplanes initiated their attacks:

Mossad is phoning Iranian regime generals and warning them to flee the country in 12 hours or be killed. @WashPost has the receipts:pic.twitter.com/JHyHwaZWLK

— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) June 23, 2025

According to one translated part of the transcript: 

“I can advise you now, you have 12 hours to escape with your wife and child. Otherwise, you’re on our list right now,” an Israeli intelligence operative told a senior Iranian general close to the country’s rulers, according to the audio recording.

The operative then suggested that Israel could train weapons on the general and his family at any moment. “We’re closer to you than your own neck vein. Put this in your head. May God protect you,” he said.

This is without doubt fueling IRGC efforts to root out Israeli spy networks, amid the general (and understandable) paranoia over potential compromise and Israeli penetration. It’s widely believed that Israel uses Iranian dissident groups, like the cultic revolutionary MEK (People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran) group, which currently has its political leadership based in Europe.

A top far-left city official in southeast Los Angeles County is now under federal investigation after allegedly posting a video on social media calling on Mexican gangs to mobilize against ICE agents. If this isn’t textbook insurrectionist behavior, it’s hard to imagine what is.

Fox News reporter Bill Melugin broke the story on X late Tuesday afternoon. He stated that Cudahy Vice Mayor Cynthia Gonzalez is under investigation for urging 18th Street and Florencia 13 gang members to defend their territory against ICE, reportedly telling gang leaders to “get your f***ing members in order.”

Here’s the report from Melugin: 

EXCLUSIVE: Per federal sources, the vice mayor of Cudahy, a city in southeast L.A. County, is under FBI investigation after she allegedly posted a video to social media in which she appears to call for 18th Street & Florencia 13 gang members in L.A. to defend their territory from ICE, even urging gang leadership to “get your fucking members in order.”

I’m told Cynthia Gonzalez posted the video late last week, then deleted it, and that the FBI later visited her home & she is under active federal investigation.

Gonzalez posted on her social media that the FBI came to her house, and she needs a lawyer.

FBI LA tells FOX they cannot confirm or deny an investigation, but that they condemn any call for gang violence.

We’ve reached out to Gonzalez via phone and email & are awaiting a response. No response yet from the city of Cudahy either. Will update as we get more.

EXCLUSIVE: Per federal sources, the vice mayor of Cudahy, a city in southeast LA County, is under FBI investigation after she allegedly posted a video to social media in which she appears to call for 18th Street & Florencia 13 gang members in LA to defend their territory from… pic.twitter.com/afJfxeSCBb

— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) June 24, 2025

Meanwhile, the city of Cudahy has posted links on social media, including X, for illegal aliens to call the “CHIRLA Rapid Response Hotline” amid ongoing local ICE raids. 

There have been no operations in Cudahy at this time.

For immediate support, call the CHIRLA Rapid Response Hotline:
(888) 624-4752

####
No se han reportado operaciones en Cudahy.

Para apoyo inmediato, llame a la Línea Directa de Respuesta Rápida de CHIRLA:
(888) 624-4752 pic.twitter.com/ebTsKJQfS0

— City of Cudahy, CA (@CityOfCudahyCA) June 21, 2025

Last week, Peter Schweizer and Seamus Bruner released a nonprofit report on the rogue leftist NGOs likely responsible for anti-ICE riots across the L.A. area, highlighting CHIRLA as a key organization involved: 

During the L.A. riots, a prominent participant was a group called the “Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights” (CHIRLA), which received money from Arabella but also millions in taxpayer money from both the federal government (under former President Joe Biden) and the city of Los Angeles, for “citizenship education.” The group claimed its activities were under a separate “action” group that received no government funds.

Ongoing investigations indicate federal authorities—specifically the FBI—are actively tracing financial flows linked to far-left NGOs attempting to spark nationwide color revolutions against President Trump. Parallel to this, now a Democratic local official is allegedly calling for the mobilization of Mexican gang members against federal agents. This rhetoric suggests a possible escalation in domestic threats.